


impermanent galaxies

by fatiguedfern



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-11
Updated: 2017-08-11
Packaged: 2018-12-13 22:50:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11770053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fatiguedfern/pseuds/fatiguedfern
Summary: A star is born.





	impermanent galaxies

“Hey, Momota-chan, can you see them?” 

Kaito shifts on his back, barely registering Ouma speaking as he struggles to sort through tar-like fragments of said boy’s plan. “Shut up. If I’m gonna peg in a couple of hours I ain’t wasting a single second listening to your bullshit longer than I have to.”

Ouma replies with pensive silence, which is a better response than he might’ve expected if it weren’t for the fact that he feels his own tongue weighed down before words can even be spoken. Kaito chalks it up to the venom twining through his already infected bloodstream. 

“Look.” Frail fingers clutch at his wrist and with a weak burst of strength Ouma flicks their joint limbs flick upwards. “Stars.” His voice unfurls in a hoarse whisper that makes Kaito almost feel sorry for him. Had Ouma always been this weak? He thinks of manic laughter and dead eyes. No, Ouma’s strength had never been physical. 

At this stage it’s not as if he has much dignity left to deprive himself of, so he follows the arch of his limply hanging elbow until his eyes rest on the lit ceiling. A dozen flickering bulbs stare back.

“We have less time than I thought if you’re already hallucinating. C’mon.” Kaito pushes himself into sitting position with protesting limbs screaming their discontent. 

Ouma giggles (though admittedly sounding more forced and unconvincing) - because of fucking course the bastard still managed to laugh while he could barely breathe, let alone stand. “Eh? Is Momota-chan doubting his ability to kill me before his girlfriend’s poison does?”

He can’t help the flinch he gives at the mention of “kill”, but before he’s able to retort, a spasm of coughing rattles through his lunges. Rusted blood scrapes across his tongue and he can’t help the growl that escapes him, further chafing his throat. Their circumstances seemed to have a pretty shitty habit of reminding them exactly how hopeless and costly each moment they wasted was.

“Save the chit-chat for the afterlife. I’m sure you and the devil’ll get on great.” Kaito hates how broken they sound. The pauses between too fragmented in length for whatever this was to be banter. The silence too thickly lain to be considered comfortable.

“I had it all planned out, y’know? People were dropping like flies, others were rushing to condemn someone to their fate like some sacrificial lamb,” Ouma pants out a breath, his unfinished tangent leaving him breathless. Kaito watches, all wide eyes and disbelieving grunts, as he shifts between a half-stuttering mess and his usual quick-witted self. Kaito blames it all on feverdreams, because anything else would be too worrying a cause. “I kept on, guiltless. Just a little further and the mastermind would fall. Just a little further and this game would come undone. But in it doesn’t matter, right? More people will flock to sign application after application, and no plan carried out by idiotic Momota will change tha-” Kaito’s sweaty palm cups over Ouma’s mouth. 

“Look, I honestly don’t fucking get half of what you’re on about,” he ignores the flash of a pen scratching out his initials on an unknown form, “but no way am I letting you flake out on _your_ goddamn plan because you’re having some mid-death crisis. Get your shit together, man.”

Ouma licks his hand, Momota’s arm instantly jolting away. He smiles weakly. “But didn’t I say I had it all figured out, Momota-chan? The moment I go splat your pedestal crumbles and you’re no hero. We die either way and I can’t say that I care how anymore. I guess it just changes the amount of casualties. In the end i-it’s what they asked for.”

His fists clench at his sides and Momota’s lips set in a hard line. “I don’t get where the fuck you get off preachin’ about guilt. There’re still people to save,” Kaito thinks of Harukawa dragged off, her sins finally catching up to her. Or worse, Kiibo, Shirogane and Yumeno being torn apart scrap by scrap. And Shuuichi rushing after them only to meet the same fate and Harukawa standing in the background with faux nonchalance plastered to her face. “...even if they don’t deserve it.”

Kaito’s met with silence once more. It’s different compared to the other spaces between speech… seems lighter. He turns to look at his circumstantial  
partner.

“Oi! I’m talking to you!” He nudges the boy’s still chest with a slipper-clad toe. Ouma’s eyes remain glassy.

“No fucking way,” Kaito whispers, a mixture of blood, saliva and bile burning his throat. “The prick can’t even die right.”

He slams his foot into the hollow of Ouma’s ribcage with all the strength he can muster. Nothing.

Mind whirring through every impromptu medicine drill he’d ever learnt at the academy, Kaito sloppily pumps at Ouma’s chest. He puffs a breath of air into the slack mouth, tasting blood other than his own between the cracks of lukewarm lips. Nothing.

It’s over. 

But surely… the plan had relied on keeping the mastermind in the dark. If he pressed the corpse into a bloody pulp surely no one would be the wiser. 

Deciding on his plan of action, Kaito stumbles to drag Ouma to the press. A stripe of bloody skid-marks trailing after him from the gaps where crossbolts had protruded. 

Lugging the body onto the press turns out to be more effort than expected and it proves far harder to adjust onto his jacket. He staggers to force the press down. A sickening crunch sounds. Kaito blames the shiver tracing up his spine on the loss of his jacket. 

He grins. The worst of it’s over. Now, all he had to do was sneak his way to an exisal. Easy, as expected of someone whose name was whispered amongst the stars.

What he doesn’t expect is for his feet to slip through the liquid oozing from the press, nor his knees giving out. His back collides with press and his hair mats with dripping crimson. The flickering constellations hanging above watch over him as he flounders. _Sorry_ , he whispers to the cosmos he sees reflected in the puddle beneath him.

Kaito’s hand prints a shape in Ouma’s blood as he vainly attempts to push himself up. It looks a bit like the crudely cut out glow in the dark stars he’d stuck all over his room as a kid through his fading vision.

_Twinkle twinkle, huh._

**Author's Note:**

> I've been super unmotivated to write lately... so I guess you can request a fic @ my [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/k1iiee-b0o) if you want! I don't have much - or any, really - experience with requests and there's a chance I won't write some things, but I'd be grateful if you'd help get me out of my slump... Thanks for reading


End file.
